 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Puppets and the Green Mountains, walking to the border, our ground bag lunch. We're starting this morning with a dialogue of Rubén Darío Salazar, the director of Teatro de Desespecial Performance in Cuba. We have only one official interview this morning, as Rubén will be speaking in Spanish, and the translation will take some time. But that will hopefully just deepen the conversation. Brown Bag Lunch interview, or a post-Breakfast interview, as you'd like, with Kimi Maeda and Julie Lickenburg about generations of otherness in the United States for the first of art as well. So, I turn the program over right now to here's, he hates it when I do it, here's John Potter. Here for this very exciting conversation. I'm John Potter. Many of you may know me as the former arts editor of the Brattleboro Reformer. I'm now the executive director of The Latches, and I'm very pleased and honored to have been asked by Sandglass to host these conversations, which have proven to be, I think, very enriching and enjoyable and stimulating. And I hope this continues. Rubén Dario Salazar, who is an author and a performer, artistic director of Teatro de las Astaciones, and his translator is Omar Perez, who is also an actor and a director as well. And I'll just, the conversation or the general shape of the conversation is the state of the theatrical life in Cuba. I'll preface this by saying that probably many of you did not see their performances at The Latches the other day, but I have seldom received more feedback from parents and children than I got. I got calls at home from parents and grateful calls saying thank you, thank you for having them here, but the credit goes to Sandglass. So I think that's a measure of how, what an impression Rubén and his troupe made, and we're grateful for them. So I'll start with a comment I found from a journalist about theater in Cuba, and we'll examine whether you can trust journalists and what they say. But this person said theater and Cuban arts and culture, there has been no equivalent of the Buena Vista Social Club that has been able to take the world by storm. And I'm not sure how true that is either, but I'd like to start by asking Rubén to describe the state of theater. And by theater we mean not just puppetry, but performing arts and theater in a very broad sense. What are the challenges? How is it doing? I think that in any place in the world theater is representative of the time it lives in. In terms of technology, in terms of any culture, Cuba is the theater that is happening right now. The theater of Cuba right now has that same sort of sentiment. It's a theater of a lot of, it's very potent. And just like in any other, some people understood, it can be also like any other theater, sometimes stale or boring. Other theaters politically correct. Everything fits in the theater of Cuba. Would you consider this a time of renaissance or great burgeoning of theater? I know it reflects the times, but what are the times saying and how is it being renaissance? Cuba is a bridge between the world, North America, Europe, America. Cuba is sort of a bridge between North America, Latin America, and things go sort of over the island. They go through the island, they go on the sides of the island. There's Eastern European influences that have come to the island. Specifically German influences, Norwegian influences, and Irish in the capital, in Havana. Being from an island, it makes you sort of grasp at all that information. In the same vein, we can applaud the Royal Ballet of London. Master Thomas is a famous Sasha Balls, a company of dance. The global Shakespeare theater as well, or two years ago the American Ballet Theater. So there's not a lack of a global conversation for theater artists in Cuba. You said the responsibility of the theater artist is that exchange that's being given. So I can't really give a very clear definition of what is a Cuban artist right now because they are cocktail of influences. Because I don't like to define anything. Because also Americans I think know very little about life outdated and misinformed. Can you and like to say everything that you want to say? Has been censored or self censored, but I have always spoken my mind. It has parallel thoughts and actions and so I coexist with both of those. Very young. And it's not in Cuba or outside. So I try to be like I'm being right now. Thank you. For those of you who have gone to performances here at the festival and says that ticket sales account for only 20% of what's needed to sustain the festival. And we're grateful for sponsors who make it possible. I'm curious as to how you finance your work. Is there a lot of state sponsorship or what are the rules of funding? There's been a big socialist funding from Eastern Europe. Like it is now. The now. There's a second movement. That I love that. Karthensia falta. Maghlinia material. The lack have been Einstein Kelvino del Broderico. The true artist just finds a way to invent with whatever they have. Through collaborations. Through the use of recycled materials, the last thing that you could imagine that would work for what you need, you find. If there's an artist that has lived in the ideal world, I don't know them. The job, the responsibility of the artist is to create their ideal world. Over the base of the fact that the ideal world doesn't exist. So that way we dedicate ourselves to create the theater, so that we can create those ideal worlds that we all need and that the public appreciates or not. Can you give an example of a moment when you created with very little resources, can you give us a specific example so we can understand how that works? In 99, an amazing designer, which is Sena Encalero, who is with us today. The only thing that we had, the only meters of sky, a design for a show, the blue hat, the hat of blue sky color, so the whole set, as you can imagine, was blue. But Sena Encalero decided to light it in a way that you could see the whiteness of the moon shining on it. And for that job, he got awards for the scenic design, the design, and puppet, the day of the award. He said, how? And it's just a blue show. It was a sensation. That's the life of the artist. Almost always. So there we have created sort of an artisanal approach. The result of that is the immense love that you put into the project and the desire to change the world. With what we just heard and that of the Mexican artists, particularly with their appreciation for a paper, works of paper, in the sense that everybody can have a piece of paper and create a show or something. Could you tell us a little bit about the history of puppetry in Cuba and how you came to puppetry? It's one of those questions where you find your life in the question. I was born in front of the puppet theater in Santiago. When a kid is born that way, I don't understand why do I have to stop? Why do I have to grow up and leave the... I never did it. Going to the puppet theater in secret. There was no puppetry program. And my peers would ask, where is he going with this? So if he's not going to see theater with us, where is he going? So I knew that was my passion. The two things at the same time. Since I graduated from the University of the Arts as an actor, I knew I wanted to work in puppet theater, theater of objects. So I joined the company that I felt had the most attractive work to me in Cuba. And it was in Matanzas, Cuba. So it was called Kite Theater. And it still exists today. And I was there for 12 years, preparing to make my leap to have the history of my country. But while I was there, I dedicated myself to research the history of puppetry in my country. You don't think you can be involved in creating puppetry if you don't know... Who are the giants that you're standing on the shoulders of, dead or alive? The strength that allows you to not take anyone for granted. Because they're different. Or to make distinctions because they're different, because of the color, because of light. You start learning to love the length of time, the space in bunraku, a Japanese form. The magic of shadow puppetry of China. Karagos? Karagos, yes. Karagos. The meaning of the punch and judy in English. Punch and judy in an American form. Cultures that have brought to the theater a world identity. And all of the cultures that have identity. When you find all this love and these feel very powerful, you have a faith and a vision. And you feel like what I'm talking a little bit about puppetry and your slideshow is working. If I can talk a little bit about the history of the theater, we know that you had a photo of me and... How do you find yourself inside? Who came before and who came after you? My first trip to the United States had a very special mission. It was to find myself again. To find myself with the living root of my history. I was here in New York. In 49. In 49. There's an amazing family. And we have some slides that we'll show as well. We have a group of titers called the Guignol of the brothers. Guignol of the brothers. Guignol of the brothers. For 20 years. They made the best Cuban puppetry available. If you notice the history of Cuban puppetry. If you notice the history of Cuban puppetry has to do with influences like like Howdy Doody or the Disney figures that we know. You can see they're all brothers, family members. She is one of the authors of Howdy Doody. The ears, the mouth, the mouth, the cheeks. The story that starts in 49 and then it's on TV. So it goes in the 50's that starts to appear on television. Street theater. The revolution happens in Cuba. And that group decides to expand into the world. But what do they do? William Butler Yeats. It's an American influence by William Butler Yeats. Am I saying that correct? Yeats, thank you. They would do Little Red Riding Hood with influence by Mondrian. In the 60's. They would do The Wizard of Oz. Barilla. They would do Spanish text like Don Juan. Classical text. Other golden era classic Spanish text. Alfred Jerry. They would do African Tales as well. And we leave it there for now. So this is a group from the 70's in Cuba. They disappear. There's a dark moment in the cultural history in Cuba there. We have to say it existed. There was a law in Cuba called Parametras. They set the parameters and if you didn't fit in those parameters you were not allowed to practice your art. You had to leave the profession. They all came to the United States. This is a photo in Miami. This is a photo in Miami. This is a photo in Miami. This is a photo in Miami. This is a photo in Miami. This is a photo in Miami. I was afraid to record this. But there's times in life where you just can't salvage that. It just dies in your country of origin. Because the interests in the United States were others. I didn't know this until I traveled to France. I didn't know this until I traveled to France. And Margarita Nicolesco, a Romanian artist, asked me. Ruben, what do you know about this group? What do you know, what's happened? And I didn't know anything. There was a decade of silence over a decade in time since the best of puppeteering that I love existed. There was a complete silence in my country. And I dedicated myself for those ten years to find the origin of puppeteering in Cuba. There's an immense and rich story. Lovely story. And sad. This is a stage over where they are already recognized in Cuba. So now that that time has passed, we've recovered that, and they're appreciated in Cuba. So I came to the United States and I brought, ¿Cómo el nombre? Carucha Camejo, back to Cuba. Unima, an international organization of puppetry. We made a huge presentation for her. She was the only one that was left that was alive. And we made a book. Unfortunately, she didn't get to see finish. She died that same year. So I took it upon myself to make sure that that base, which we created on this history, existed and is known. It's the only thing that has allowed me to move forward and create in peace. It's the only thing that has allowed me to move forward and create in peace. This is very good today. Do you consider yourself and your work to be activists, to be working for a particular type of social change or cultural change? And if so, what? I think so, yes. Giving classes in the University of the Arts of Puppetry, publishing books, promoting puppetry all over the island, organizing an international festival, doing workshops, conferences and coursework all over the island on puppetry, and to make young people help them fall in love with puppetry. And to defend puppetry's place within that system. I'm part of the provincial government in Matanzas. I'm the only artist. It makes me responsible to make sure that I care for this from a very concrete base, for this industry. I don't want to be a misunderstood artist or an artist that is not understood in fun. I already passed my bad child phase. I want to work from the point of view of knowing that puppetry has this amazing presence in this industry. I've seen it here. That puppets, and I've seen in documentaries here, that puppets are used sometimes to create social change. Or in a visual artist who bring new collaborations to puppetry. To be able to do something like this to be able to do an interview in the beautiful museum of the arts of Radarburg. We're in a very good place moment in time right now. But the struggle continues. Because we should never be satisfied with anything. We hope the impossible. We wish for the impossible. You talked about puppetry's place in Cuban culture and society and making sure it had a place. What can it do with its place? What's its role? If you're successful in making sure that puppetry is still alive and vibrant, where does it go from there, what's its role? I don't think it has any power. It has the obligation to mix itself within the other arts to walk together to walk towards change and evolution and so that it serves more than entertainment. I think it's a special moment and that we should take advantage of that every day and add more to what we are doing. Everything that we can. Thank you. It's a good lead into your art that we saw at the Latchez. Mixing other art forms, it wasn't really strictly puppetry, but it blended puppetry and dance and acting and music was very prominent. So talk about the mix of art forms in your work. So the ugly duck language is the piece from Theatre of the Seasons is from 2006. It was a way of us saying puppeteers are not just these folks who are sort of behind the scene that they could dance if they wanted to. That they could work with mass if they wanted to. They could use the lyrical style of opera if they wanted to. And all of that helped me out puppeteers, the plain two-dimensional flat puppetry. And only using a very small frame as our backdrop. Has that speed that emulates computers today. And that on top of the story of Anderson, we're adding a new concept. That is the concept of accepting the natural. See difference as something that is natural. I thought that it was very beautiful, that imagery of the ugly duckling that becomes beautiful. If you're an ugly duckling, you usually stay an ugly duckling. That's not what was important. Cinderella. Cinderella. Thank you, you do it now. Duck was more important. How it is, the duck as it is, multicolor, with all of their colors inside. But since I am a non-conformist completely. At the end, when he finally finds his world of colors, that's black and white. And this one, now what? So the story begins anew. Like life begins anew. Because like life, like art also begins. Like love begins again. Towns restart life again after wars. After a long time of depression. I love differences. Because the world itself is different. And at the same time, the same. We've done a great service to ugly ducklings. We've done a great service to the piece of ugly duckling. How is the relationship now with the United States, that if it's getting better, and if that changes something in your art? I'm not John Kerry. I'm not John Kerry. Bruno Gonzalez, I'm not Bruno Gonzalez. The State of... A bridge that was actually never broken. Cuban artists and North American artists have been collaborating for years. Regardless of the diplomatic ties of the countries. I was in... I was here in 2011. So I stood up in 2014. The 14th of April in 2014. So we inaugurated our festival. That was a global welcome of puppetry. With a North American group. Sanglass theater was the ones who inaugurated this global festival in Cuba. Many of my colleagues from the organizing committee were wondering, why do you choose Rubén as a North American group? That we have against the North Americans. For the first time, there's a North American group working at the festival. Why don't we start with them? Especially if it's a cultural master like Eric Best. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity that I grabbed and seized. And Eric took advantage of it even more than I did. Of course, in an innocent way. Convocó para la escena al vice-ministro de Cultura de Cuba. Director Provincial de Cultura de Matanzas. Y a la Presidenta de Arte de Cénicas de Matanzas. Y los... Demostrando que el arte siempre ha estado mucho más allá de la política. Porque el arte es una política que rompe barreras. Una política que se fija en el alma del pueblo. Una política que no es hipócrita. Porque el artista cuando actúa se entrega con todas sus luces. Muy lento. ¿Cuál fue tu reacción cuando Eric lo hizo? Tampoco soy un vencible. Un gran funcionario en la escena. Yo dije, Eric, sabrá. Pero él lo hizo muy bien. Y en mi interior me dije a mí mismo. Que sea lo que Dios quiera. Intentivamente Dios es muy titiritero. Es el titiritero que nos maneja a todos nosotros. Por eso me gusta ser titiritero. Es ser un poco Dios. Todo lo que hemos hablado, siente que es un momento histórico en el titiritero en Cuba. Un todo lo que se ha dicho y él te viaje también y no para atrás. So the concept of the history of puppetry. That's for others to do. Theatre of the Seasons is doing its part. Very conscious way. This is a door that opens not for us but for Cuba. A opportunity that we have to take. Dialogue is awesome. And we are all responsible, all Cubans be it the theater artists, the doctors, the lawyers. It's a moment that is impossible to do from the outside. I respect everyone who lives outside of Cuba. But the battle is from within. Living inside. And confronting the change, the benefits, everything that is happening there. You never sure of your home with your family. And we know that our family is not all the same color. And the same height. So questions. You just said the change needs to happen from inside. Where so many young people are leaving. From Cuba. So many people are leaving now more than ever. Because the United States allows Cubans to come and get citizenship unique in the world and nobody else gets it. So how do you feel about the departures and what could be done to thank Cuba so that they can work for change from within like you say? I think it's a global question. I think there are a lot of youth everywhere. That is a legitimate right. And it's a very juvenile right to look for their place in the world. I, because of my job got the opportunity very early on to travel the world. And I didn't have to find in another place what I already had within me. And the main thing that any country should do is take care of their country on all social and economic levels. I think the best thing for a country to do is to do the things that need to happen in a country the economic, the social aspect. But that's not something that any country does by itself. They all depend on a lot of different social currents. Hope that walks. They're going to be that regardless of whatever system they're in and they will either return or not. Depending on where they found their space in the world. I can just say that I try to do my their place without clipping their wings. And if it's with art or whatever you want. I'll step in I'll talk about some of the work you're creating now. There's a moment in Cuba very, very rich in Cuba right now. We just finished a popular Cuban singer working with puppetry that we just finished working with a very popular Cuban singer working with puppetry that we just finished that we never thought could be in a puppetry popular music a very Caribbean image and it's a project that we are now touring through all of Cuba. Necessary It's called A Story of Love in a Baroque He's the popular singer and that's one of the puppets of the show. It's a live music performance. She talks about the impossible love between a child and a siren and for her to get her legs has to pass through adventures They sail together to get away That's a project that we've done for the whole family That's a project that we've done for the whole family and a very surrealist object-based piece So this is the surreal object-based piece and it's based on Buster Keaton The Garcia Lorca So it's an adaptation of Lorca's piece Pass This is Buster Keaton with his kids We see his brilliance with plastic arts He can go from all colors to two colors This is another moment as cups This is a very sensual moment in the play It's a spectacle of the subconscious with all of the demons and all of the illusions of the human mind It's like two creations that are in polar opposite of each other And now, after seeing Degeneration, which is sanglass pieces tonight, yesterday I leave with many thoughts and that's what art is for to sort of knock you around in your place and pick up your pieces together and the other thing is formula the prescription of a doctor but that's not theater Ah, Eric Adults Completely For children for adults and for adults that's the proportion of all of Cuba largely because the government has funded art education in schools Do you see that being threatened now by the changes in the structure of the government? Yes I think they'll take care of them The arts are a very important tool and weapon in any nation When a nation doesn't realize that art is the soul of the nation they lose a lot I think there's an interest to save the form It's one of the values that the country does not want to lose It's actually at this moment that they're looking to me to form a national school for puppetry I just hope that it's very real to be able to invite global puppeteers to come and give classes in the school It would be a beautiful way to give back the teachers that we have got Eric is very much invited next year to join in a global festival that will take place in Cuba on a puppetry So from Canada to the United States to Argentina I think it's time to form a continental family a very strong continental puppetry family So that can come to light And the government is the one that is supporting us in doing this With hotels, with food With transportation So we can have up to 15 Just like the previous year we brought 80 puppeteers from all over the world And it was done with government money The government of which I'm the only you've got to be on the inside here As to what you see as the unique Cuban cultural aspects of your work I'm Cuban And I can't stop thinking in Cuban about my origin or ethnicity A very high And that is Hold on Turn it into theater Because that's what the world But if you go to My colors are Cuban The text that I use Because I don't live anywhere else I live in mine With all of the strengths and weaknesses of a country And all the good things and the bad things of a country All of the suns and the moons of a country So therefore my puppets are all 100% Cuban Else there's still a little bit of time 12 Primarily in New York City with a company called Puerto Rican based company I knew that Teatro de las Estaciones was going to join us and be in the states So I got a wonderful call from Eric Bass asking if I could come up in translate And I think I was packed before the conversation finished And so I've spent the week comparing notes from the two islands The very common phrases that they and I laugh quite a bit together And my work as an artist as an actor, well the actor for hire I do what the director wants but as a director and as a creator I do create also subjects on social justice I'm preparing in December to work in a collaboration between beatboxers and image theater actors in our company in Pregonas And the subject is it's currently called a nation's beat And we are just prepared to tackle a very difficult subject that is very current and we come into rehearsal with respect that someone can feel but also that we want to respect all sides of the moment and no longer see victim of police not having moments they extend the conversation and say this moment was this person was a human being who had a life and had people they loved and loved them and with Reben about puppetry and a director in theater and with Eric I think I've talked Eric out in so much that I not even close it's my goal but then he's good but I think the interesting thing is that there's definitely a social justice context in this festival and so we're all like-minded artists who work in different mediums and this is a great opportunity not only to talk as artists but cultural artists from very different backgrounds about something that we're all passionate about which is the human condition and what we can learn from it and what we can give back Reben introduced Sene Calero Founders of the company is my companion for 28 all the images of the theater one of the actors Garcia is one of the stars of our company Buster Keaton he was a Buster Keaton that you saw there a formal theater education he comes from an acting background but he knows how to think and puppet very young he's 36 we can say very proudly Senegze 60 Maria Laura Germán Maria Laura Germán she's a graduate of the same university of the arts she's 26 years old she studied playwriting she studied playwriting and the next piece that we're doing is her piece she is very spastic participates in a lot of different aesthetics in the arts I have no problems with that I don't pay for exclusivity for our actors I would love to but I don't she's 24 years old she is I know her she's 16 years old she went to study about library systems in Havana and she told her that's not your thing your thing is puppetry and acting and you'll be back I don't have children I don't have children children are very children are very children are very badly behaved but she is my most badly behaved but she is an excellent actress very creative very creative as the two that you have and I know that these are people that I can trust and we have Luis Toledo he's 22 years old he's studying right now in the University of the Arts he's studying theater critique with us in the group and I do with the iron fist and the cotton glove that's how I treat him but he learns because he learned with two rocks I have a flower and a piece and it's the youngest generation of theater and it's he's of the youngest generation of theater my age is like Peter Pan thank you very much